infection

WALK INTO JUST about any health facility in the province and you’ll notice hand-sanitizer stations in every direction you look. They’re mounted on walls at entrances, in waiting rooms, outside elevators, and at patients’ bedsides. The antibacterial dispensers are a big part of preventing and controlling the spread of infections in hospitals and clinics.
“About 70 to 80 percent of hospital infections can be attributed to direct contact with patients,” said Dr. Marc Romney, Providence Health Care’s medical director for infection prevention and control. “So if we can ensure that those hands are clean…then we are much more likely to decrease rates of hospital-acquired infections.” Romney, a medical microbiologist at St. Paul’s Hospital, told the Straight by phone that the emergence of a new family of antibiotic-resistant bacteria called carbapenem-resistant Enterobacteriaceae (CRE) is proving a challenge for infection-control efforts.

Hospitals in B.C. are on the lookout for a new class of antibiotic-resistant superbugs that have hit more than 200 hospitals in the U.S. in only six months. The Centre for Disease Control in the U.S. has warned Canadian health authorities about the increase of Carbapenem-resistant Enterobacteriaceae (CRE), a deadly class of superbugs that are resistant to all known antibiotics. Dr. Marc Romney, a medical microbiologist at St. Paul’s Hospital in Vancouver, said B.C. health authorities are aware of CRE and are taking preventative measures.